A Beginner's Guide to Safe and Pleasurable Pain Play

As with any other activities involving physical pain, safety and consent are paramount when engaging in pain play. You need to understand the activities you wish to participate in and decide how best to manage any risks involved. Maintain open communication with your partner, ensuring they are as engaged and knowledgeable as you are. Take this seriously—don’t worry, it’ll still be fun.

Pain Play Tips for Beginners

Before beginning your journey into pain play, I strongly recommend that you familiarize yourself with the perspectives of other kink educators. Understanding multiple viewpoints will give you a more comprehensive understanding of the field and help you find your interests and boundaries.

Take It Slow and Steady. While it might seem sexy to have your partner spank you until your butt is black and blue—that sensation might last for a week! But have you considered how painful and distracting it might be to sit in an office chair with a bruised butt after a week? When you’re still exploring your limits, it’s better to go lighter than what you think you can handle.

Frequent Check-Ins. Pain can affect you in unexpected ways. It might trigger distressing memories or strong feelings of shame, it might hurt more than you can bear, or you might have difficulty expressing these feelings until you realize you need a break. Make sure you and your play partner plan for frequent pauses.

Explore Different Methods. Pain play doesn’t always have to involve spankings because you’ve been “naughty.” It can involve your partner worshipping you with countless orgasms until you beg them to stop, or staying in an uncomfortable pet position, or using a cooled-down sex toy for self-pleasure, or practicing deep throat with restraints. Pain play can be non-sexual, or foreplay, or the center of a sex scene. If you’re inspired, explore!

Ensure You’re in a Healthy Mental State. Consciously seeking painful stimulation can challenge your mental health. Before engaging in pain play, make sure you’ve thoroughly assessed your emotional state. Ensure you’re doing it because it’s fun, not because you think you “deserve” to be hurt. No one deserves harm.

Recommendations for Pain Play

Ice Cubes

The best way to showcase cruelty. Slightly melt the ice cubes and then glide them over sensitive areas, or place them on a trembling stomach or inner thigh until they completely melt.

Pinwheels

These prickly little toys have many small variations in design, but essentially they are blunt-tipped wheels that can be rolled over the skin. Despite their intimidating appearance, they won’t pierce your skin—just give a gentle poke! Depending on your sensitivity level, a pinwheel might feel like tickling, biting, or that fuzzy feeling when your limb falls asleep.

Spanking

Spanking is probably the most easily recognizable form of pain play. You hit something, and that something hurts. I usually recommend beginners start with affordable paddles. These lightweight tools often hurt less than spanking by hand. Using a tool adds extra excitement, especially when you’re role-playing.

Tickling

If you’re particularly sensitive or if tickling goes on too long, it can be excruciating. Submit yourself to a thorough tickling—perhaps while bound and blindfolded, so all you can do is squirm—and let your partner enjoy your choked laughter, tearful smiles, and desperate gasps.

Wax Play

There’s nothing quite like the quick sting and subsequent cooling of warm wax dripping on your skin. (It’s fun—but tedious—to peel off all the waxy dots afterward!) You can draw patterns, drip from a distance or up close (be careful with the flame!), or vary where you drip wax to create a surprising jolt of sensation.

Overstimulation

After a lot of stimulation (such as touching, tickling, etc.) or after orgasm, heightened sensitivity can occur. This is prime territory for pain play, as it takes very little to elicit a response. There are many ways to seek heightened sensitivity, like using a pump to plump up your nipples, vulva, or penis, and then skimming over them with a vibrator.

Forced Orgasms

Sometimes, pain is simply a result of “too much of a good thing.” Forced orgasms are those you coax forth through sheer power—even when you’re not ready! Vibrators with large heads are popular for forced orgasms because they’re too big to escape and have incredibly strong vibrations. There are also beginner-friendly options, such as the Magic Nyx, a panty vibrator developed by Magic Motion, which is claimed to be the thinnest vibrator on the market. This compact toy is easy to carry and can provide stimulating “pain” at unexpected moments, leading to ultimate pleasure.